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Brian Paddick Speaks Out Against Police Station Closures
October 24, 2011 9:53 AM
As if to underscore the current plight of local policing and persistent rumours of local police station closures, hard on the heels of announcements to cease 24-hour police front desks leaving just one per borough, comes news that custody suites are also to be centralized at Brixton.
Last week Lib Dem Candidate for next May's London Mayoral Elections, Brian Paddick, visited Streatham High Road alongside GLA Lib Dem Leader, Caroline Pidgeon, and local councillors to meet residents and shopkeepers.
Like police station front counters, the move to having centralized custody suites in Brixton means that these facilities will be removed from existing stations in Streatham and Kennington making them less likely to survive long-term.
Brian Paddick urged local people to oppose the plan saying that Brixton Police Station was already grossly overcrowded - and he should know, Brian Paddick was Lambeth's popular Borough Commander in 2001.
He said: "The queues at Brixton already for people at the front counter are just extraordinary. The front counter is completely inadequate anyway.
"If you send every person arrested in the whole of borough [to Brixton], people are going to be queuing up for an hour- including solicitors going to see their clients. Officers are going to have to travel much longer distances. How are friends and relatives going to get all the way across the borough?
"I do not think people realise this is the plan and that it has been the plan for some time. But people can make a change now."